The revenue part of the state budget of Tajikistan for the first month of the coming year was overfulfilled by 230 million somoni ($22.3 million).
The total amount of the state budget in January 2023 amounted to over 3.2 billion somoni ($311 million), which is 7.7% more than the revised plan, the country’s Ministry of Finance reports.
In January last year, the budget was overfulfilled by 7.1%: instead of the planned 1 billion 970 million somoni, the country’s main wallet received about 2 billion 120 million somoni.
The excess of planned indicators in January of this year is explained, first of all, by the growth of tax revenues to the budget, in particular due to income tax (former income tax and income tax), VAT and excise.
It should be noted that in recent years (until 2022), the country’s budget revenues could not be systematically fulfilled in the first half of the year due to a shortfall in tax revenues in the initial months.
On January 1, 2022, a new Tax Code came into force, with more forgiving rates for some taxes. For example, the standard VAT rate, which forms more than 40% of budget tax revenues, has been reduced from 18% to 15%.
Independent experts argue that the reduction in the tax burden stimulates an increase in tax revenues to the budget due to the withdrawal of business from its income from the shadows.
According to the Ministry of Finance, the total volume of the State Budget of Tajikistan in 2022 amounted to about 36.4 billion (more than $3.5 billion), which is 3.8% more than the revised plan.
Growth of tax revenues of the budget last year amounted to 6.7%.
However, the share of tax revenues to the budget in 2022 decreased to 60% from 66.7% in the previous year.
Hope for double-digit revenue growth
The authorities are counting on a high increase in state budget revenues in 2023 – by 12.3% or 4.1 billion somoni. With this growth, annual receipts in the country’s “main purse” could increase to 37.1 billion somoni ($3.6 billion).
Budget expenditures for 2023 are set at 38.1 billion somoni, which is 4.5 billion more compared to the budget for the past year.
Thus, the 2023 state budget deficit (the excess of spending over income) is over 1 billion somoni and equals 0.8% of the country’s GDP.
Despite the relatively high level of the deficit, the government plans to increase salaries (for state employees), pensions and scholarships, cash benefits and compensation for vulnerable segments of the population, as well as the amount of support for social protection institutions during the year.
Expenditures on social spheres in the coming year are planned in the amount of 18.6 billion somoni, which is almost half of the total amount of state budget expenditures.
However, this year the budget financing of practically all branches and sectors of the republic’s economy is increasing.
More than half of the budget deficit is planned to be covered by loans from international financial organizations.
Also, to cover the deficit in the budget, the following sources appear:
– privatization and lease of republican property;
– profit due to the state’s share in various businesses;
– profit from the sale of bills;
– free funds of the republican budget as of January 1, 2023;
– saving money on tenders for public procurement of goods, works and services.